Light and Shadow
by Carmen

Everyone, this is Shadow the Cat

I first met Shadow almost 5 and a half years ago; he used to visit the place where I worked, he was one of the neighbours' cats. He was a young, assertive, not neutered tomcat, who wanted attention and he wasn't shy about it, and since we didn't know his name, we took the liberty of naming him Shadow.

Being left behind by the neighbours when they moved, he lived for a while with my partner's sister and her partner - big cat and animal lovers - and their other 5 cats, but he just didn't get along with them (the cats) too well. He wanted a bit more attention that the other cats and seemed to not fit perfectly in the household. While he was very well taken care of and loved, I think he would have liked to be the centre of the attention all the time, instead of taking turns with the other cats (and dogs, and fish, and turtoise). So while we were visitng them on my birthday two years ago, I offered to take him, and now I can say it was the best thing I ever did, certainly for me, hopefully for him as well.

He is a happy, healthy cat, he has two humans at his beck and call, a close friend named Henri (the neighbours' cat) who shares his space with him, but does not come to bother him, and an eternal special place in our hearts. He is so loved by our friends and family, he receives his own Christmas cards and gets featured on ours.

Do expect a lot more photos of Shadow, mostly because he is such a good subject to photograph, but also because I have crazy cat lady tendencies and I could talk about cats all day long.